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Thursday, December 17, 2009

"Meditations on First Philosophy" by Rene Descartes,1641


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Meditations on First Philosophy (subtitled In which the existence of God and the immortality of the soul are demonstrated) is a philosophical treatise written by René Descartes first published in Latin in 1641. The French translation was made by the Duke of Luynes with the supervision of Descartes and was published in 1647 with the title Méditations Metaphysiques. The original Latin title is Meditationes de prima philosophia, in qua Dei existentia et animæ immortalitas demonstratur. The book is made up of six meditations, in which Descartes first discards all belief in things which are not absolutely certain, and then tries to establish what can be known for sure. The meditations were written as if he were meditating for 6 days: each meditation refers to the last one as "yesterday". However, Descartes did not take 6 days to complete this work; it actually took several years.

The Meditations consist of the presentation of Descartes' metaphysical system in its most detailed level and in the expanding of Descartes' philosophical system, which he first introduced in the fourth part of his Discourse on Method (1637). Descartes' metaphysical thought is also found in the Principles of Philosophy (1644), which the author intended to be a philosophy guidebook.

Contents
1 Meditations
1.1 Meditation I: Concerning Those Things That Can Be Called into Doubt
1.2 Meditation II: Concerning the Nature of the Human Mind: That It Is Better Known Than the Body
1.3 Meditation III: Concerning God, That He Exists
1.4 Meditation IV: Concerning the True and the False
1.5 Meditation V: Concerning the Essence of Material Things, and Again Concerning God, That He Exists
1.6 Meditation VI: Concerning the Existence of Material Things, and the Real Distinction between Mind and Body

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